Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M.K. Stalin has breakfast with the students of Corporation Primary School Aathimoolam II, during the inauguration of Chief Minister’s Breakfast Scheme in Madurai September 15, 2022.
| Photo Credit: The Hindu
The Chief Minister’s Breakfast Scheme, which was initially devised to provide nutritious breakfast to 1,14,095 students of classes I to V studying in 1,545 government schools, has now been extended to 31,000 government schools across the State, benefitting 17 lakh students.
The scheme, which was launched by Chief Minister M.K. Stalin on September 15, 2022, was being implemented mainly to ensure that hunger should not be a barrier to education. It was also to ensure that students came to school without hunger. The aim of the scheme was to reduce hunger, prevent malnutrition, achieve average height in children, prevent underweight in adolescents, prevent anaemia as well as vitamin B12 deficiency, according to a press release.
Special attention was given to how the scheme should be implemented and what types of food should be provided . A list of food that has to be served for each day has been prepared: 50 grams of cereals such as rava, wheat, rice, millets, 15 grams of dal, and locally available vegetables are provided per child per day; 150 to 200 grams of cooked food and 60 grams of sambar with vegetables are being served.
The Union Government, though in its New Education Policy, has suggested that breakfast should be provided to school students along with a mid-day meal, has not taken any effort to implement the scheme. The Tamil Nadu government has implemented the scheme in different phases and is now expanding it to the entire State, the release said.